Like the flashbacks in Bollywood movies, it all flashed in front of my eyes. Thirteen years! Its been thirteen years since the Dreamz Group
has been guiding these capstone/final year engineering projects. Doing
something consistently and with high quality for that long is certainly
something.
It
all began in 2003, when a group of us friends thought we should do
something to build better engineers coming out of colleges. The decision
was to focus on these final year projects, be good mentors to the
students. And then identify challenging problems to solve, work on their
solutions, and do so by following best practices from the industry.
The initiative was very successful. Our projects won prizes at prestigious institutes, presented papers at conferences like OLS, but importantly I believe it was an awesome learning experience for everyone involved, the mentor and the mentee.
We
never intended for it to run this long, so we certainly must have done
something right, probably accidentally, along the way. And I have been
thinking what made it work, here are the top few. Most of these seem
basic common sense, but hey, that’s what made it.
The “Why”?
We
did a good job of internalizing why exactly are we doing this. It
provided us a great anchor to base our decisions and take on new
initiatives. Every year, any session we did with students, we reiterated
publicly why we are doing this. We threw the doors open for anybody
looking for help to reach out to us. I think these repeated public
declarations, helped everyone internalize it. Probably like a pledge but
with more earnestness and meaning.
A
case in point is how we viewed other project guiding groups that came
up over the years. We always aimed to get along well with all these. In
fact, for students that had gone through our screening process, we also
shared our true feedback about them and made referrals at other places
for guiding projects. There is no rivalry in teaching, its a good deed.
Involvement
After
a couple of years of the activity, we thought: why should learning (or
involvement) stop when the students finish off their projects? What else
could you do? Since then the senior students were deeply involved with
our screening process, running many rounds all by themselves. Some
interested folks also acted as co-mentors for the next batches of
students. Regular sync-ups ensured that the same values and ethos
carries forward through the process.
In
all of this, I think everyone developed a sense of ownership, and a
community around this work. We made many changes in our processes and
approaches, and almost every one of them came through by suggestions
from the newly involved folks. We automatically kept up with the times, because a younger batch kept guiding us :).
Along
the way, the baton of organizing and mentoring these projects has gone
from multiple generations of students. My hearty thanks to all those who
have been involved.
Mutual Respect
I learned many things through this activity, but the biggest take away, no doubt, was people.
While
I was at this project exhibition (that I mention at the top), I met
many folks who I had the privilege of mentoring. Folks, across multiple
batches, few of the best students in the best educational institute, and
who have gone on and made a difference.
I
don’t meet most for years, but when we do meet, the mutual affection
and respect gushes forth like a reborn stream at the sight of first
rains. It is these bonds, these relationships that make it so
worthwhile.
Times
change, technologies change, and this initiative will continue to adapt
and finally stop at some point. Till then, here’s to hoping more such
fun experiences!
Thanks to pixabay for the title image.